Should've Said No
by The Last Letter
Summary: Byron pleads with his daughter to keep his secret. Aria can't believe he has one.


_It's strange to think the songs we used to sing,__  
__The smiles, the flowers, everything,__  
__Is gone.__  
__Yesterday I found out about you,__  
__Even now just looking at you,__  
__Feels wrong.__  
__You say, that you'd take it all back,__  
__Given one chance, it was a moment of weakness,__  
__And you said yes_

"Aria."

"Don't talk to me." She hissed. She stalked from one end of her room to the other, filling the cardboard box on her bed with the knickknacks and memories that had been accumulated from Byron over the years.

"Aria, honey, you can't avoid me forever," Byron insisted, leaning against the doorframe, watching his daughter.

"Watch me!" She cried, her entire frame shaking as she faced down her father.

"Look, honey," he took a step toward her, but she jolted backward, so Byron paused and tried again, "I know you're upset, but we need to talk about this."

"What is there to talk about?" Aria demanded. "You are fucking some other woman!"

"Language!"

"YOU DO NOT GET TO BE MY FATHER RIGHT NOW!" She shouted, spinning on her heel and throwing a picture of her and her father into the box. She wished her mother was home, that Ella hadn't taken a mother-son weekend with Mike. Ella needed to know.

Byron forced his way into the room, despite the dark waves he was getting from Aria. "But I am your father, and we need to discuss what you saw."

"I saw you with some woman that was not Mom!" Aria lashed out again. "And she deserves to know. I don't understand what else you need to talk about."

Byron tried a different tactic. He picked up a family photo that they had professionally done six months ago – right before Aria's hair had gone pink. "Do you see this family?"

She stayed frozen, arms crossed over her chest, jaw clenched as she tried to will this cheating asshole out of her bedroom.

"These people are happy. This daughter is happy, this mother is happy, the son, the father, and who are you to take that away from them?"

"I am not the one taking away their happiness!"

"It was a mistake. I swear to you, it won't happen again."__

_You should've said no,__  
__You should've gone home,__  
__You should have thought twice before you let it all go.__  
__You should've known that word about what you did with her would get back to me.__  
__And I should've been there, in the back of your mind,__  
__Shouldn't be asking myself why,__  
__You shouldn't be begging for forgiveness at my feet,__  
__You should've said no,__  
__Daddy and you might still have me.__  
_

"Why?" Aria finally forced out, trying to digest 'it won't happen again'. It should not have happened in the first place.

"I don't know." Byron sighed, "Adult life is complicated, as someday you'll find out."

"I don't see what's so complicated about it," Aria insisted coldly. "You decided that Mom wasn't good enough for you and that you needed some young, cheap tramp so that you could feel better about yourself."

"I will not tolerate you speaking about Meredith that way," Byron's voice cracked like a whip in the otherwise silent and empty home. "This had nothing to do with your mother, because she is an amazing woman."

"I know. Too bad she seems to have horrible taste in men."

Byron stared at his little girl in front of him. What had happened to the little girl who had stared up at him with those huge eyes and had hung onto every word that he said? What had happened to the little girl who wrote an essay on how her father was her hero every year in elementary school?

"You should not have been with Meredith!" Aria continued, allowing the rant that had been building in her mind to spew from her lips. "You should have been home, appreciating the life you have! Is Mom not enough, is your family not enough? Why do you need to go looking for more!" Tears pricked at her eyes, and Aria willed herself not to cry. She was too angry to show a moment of weakness by allowing a tear to drip down her cheek. "Why are we not enough?"

___You can see that I've been cryin',__  
__Daddy you know all the right things,__  
__To say.__  
__But do you, honestly,__  
__Expect me, to believe,__  
__We could ever be the same.__  
__You say, that the past is the past,__  
__You need one chance, it was a moment of weakness,__  
__And you said yes._

"Don't cry, honey," Byron moved to pull her into a hug, to allow her to sob into his shoulder as she had done for years and years.

"Don't. You. Dare. Touch. Me." Aria hissed.

"I need you to listen to me," Byron urged. "What happened with Meredith was a mistake. You have every single right to be angry with me and I don't blame you in the slightest. How could I? I disrespected your mother, this family and myself. No one under this roof deserves that. And I will spend the rest of my life trying to atone for it."

"Does that mean you'll tell Mom?" Aria kept her question short, trying to reel her tears back in.

"I don't see why your mother needs to know. It was one mistake." Byron tried to smile at her, but Aria was having none of it.

"I don't see why you had to do anything at all."

"Neither do I," Byron admitted. "But a mistake is a mistake Aria. I can't go back and change anything, though I wish I could."

"I can't believe you." Aria shook her head. "All my life you talk to me about the right decisions, thinking things through and it turns out you are the biggest moron of them all?"

"Aria!"

"No, Dad, no! You are stupid. You are stupid and useless and I can't believe you!" The tears finally came through, her anger at her father, her pity, yes pity, for her mother and the grief at losing the constant, steady, role model that her father had always been for her. "I thought you were better than that, Dad."

"Do you have to judge me so harshly on one little thing?"

__

_You should've said no,__  
__You should've gone home,__  
__You should have thought twice before you let it all go.__  
__You should've known that word about what you did with her would get back to me.__  
__And I should've been there, in the back of your mind,__  
__Shouldn't be asking myself why,__  
__You shouldn't be begging for forgiveness at my feet,__  
__You should've said no__  
__Daddy and you might still have me.._

"I'm only a man and I do make mistakes, and this was probably the worst one I ever made."

"Why didn't you think?" Aria bit her lip, feeling the salt of her tears rub against her tongue.

"I don't know," Byron admitted. "I should have, really, I should."

Aria turned her back on him. Her father should have done a lot of things, that Meredith woman was not one of them.

"Aria, please," Byron begged, "just keep this between us. Just forget you ever saw it."

"FORGET?" Aria raged. She balled her hands into fists and forced herself to stare at her wall, rather than face her father. "I can never forget. You didn't just betray Mom. You betrayed this entire family."

"It was a mistake. How many times do I have to say it?"

"How many times were you with her?" Aria's nails bit into her palm as she thought back to yesterday, with Ali at her side as they stared at her father and the woman that was not her mother. "Yesterday wasn't the first. So don't you dare lie to me."

"Honestly, honey, I don't know. But not a single one of those times meant more to me than your mother and this family does."

Aria's mind raged, battering against her skull. How could he keep lying? If this family meant anything, if Ella, Mike and herself meant anything, he wouldn't have done what he did. There wouldn't have been anything for her and Ali to see when they turned down that side street away from Mona. Her father should have been in his office grading papers, or maybe making an afterschool phone call to Ella.

"You need to leave," Aria whispered.

_I can't resist,__  
__Before you go tell me this,__  
__Was it worth it,__  
__Was she worth this.__  
__No, no, no, no.__  
_

"Aria, you can't tell your mother." Byron stayed exactly where he was, unwilling to move until he knew whether or not his marriage was over.

Aria stayed silent. If Ella knew, it would kill her. Her parents would definitely get a divorce, and then what would happen to her and Mike? But how could she look her father in the face every day, watch him kiss Ella every day, and not say a word about how Byron had been wrapped around some blonde that was closer in age to his daughter than his wife?

"Just go away." Aria sighed. She didn't want to think anymore. She didn't want to deal with this problem that shouldn't even exist and that should definitely not be on her shoulders.

"Aria," Byron's voice was sharp. "Not a word. To anyone."

"Was she worth all this?" Aria turned and faced her father, renewed fury in her eyes. "Was she worth probably losing mom over? Was she worth this argument between you and me? You had to know that someone was going to find out and that the moment anyone if your family heard it was going to be all over."

Byron ignored her question. "Don't say anything to your mom." He pleaded. "I will give you whatever you ask, just don't breathe a word to Ella."

Aria's jaw dropped. He was actually bargaining with her. "Get out of my face." She ordered. Who was this man that had the face of her father but the personality of a scummy street thug?

___You should've said no,__  
__You should've gone home,__  
__You should have thought twice before you let it all go.__  
__You should've known that word about what you did with her would get back to me.__  
__And I should've been there, in the back of your mind,__  
__Shouldn't be asking myself why,__  
__You shouldn't be begging for forgiveness at my feet,__  
__You should've said no,__  
__Daddy and you might still have me._

"Promise me," Byron stood so that he was towering over his daughter. He realized, with shame, that he was trying to intimidate her.

"You never should have done anything." Aria shook her head. "And I can't promise anything to a liar and a cheat."

"I'm still your father."

"You may be part of my DNA and part of my childhood, but you are not my dad. My daddy was a good man who loved his family and would never have done anything to hurt them. He never would have condoned his daughter lying to anyone, especially her mother." Aria shut her eyes, but still saw his face. "I can't believe you."

"I know, I know. What I did was wrong but why hurt your mother with this information."

"Fine." Aria hissed, hating herself for giving in but seeing no choice. "I won't tell Mom, but you should."

"If the moment is ever right, I will tell your mom." Byron said.

"Like you know anything about right and wrong anymore." Aria rolled her eyes.

Byron, knowing he couldn't say anything, turned to leave. Once he reached her door, however, he turned around for one last thing. "Aria?"

"What?"

"Forgive me? Maybe not today, but someday."

Aria hesitated and Byron felt a bubble of hope. She was his baby girl and she couldn't hate him forever. But she turned around and pinned him down with her eyes.

"I will never forgive you."

**I altered the lyrics a little. I changed 'baby' to 'Daddy' in every line they appeared. The song is **_**Should've Said No**_** by **_**Taylor Swift.**_** I don't own the song or **_**Pretty Little Liars**_**. I hope I did the song and the show justice.**

**~TLL~**


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